WUWY: The Invisible Weight: A Study On How Personal Financial Stress Affects Black Women In The Workplace

The Invisible Weight: A Study On How Personal Financial Stress Affects Black Women In The Workplace

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Here and my girls. Stacy Tisdall, my co host for
Wealth Wednesday, is here with me.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
Happy Wealth Wednesdays everybody. As usual, we are bringing it
with two amazing women. We have Jacquette Timmans, who's a
financial behaviorist, Sandra Kentz, who is the former CEO of
Paradigm for Parody. And not something that everybody goes through. Okay,
follow this. Have you ever had so many bills, so

(00:30):
much debt, so many financial problems that you just couldn't
concentrate for one second at work?

Speaker 1 (00:36):
Oh, you can't sleep at night, you can't split at
your exhausit in the morning because your mind is racing
trying to figure out how am I going to take
care of all this?

Speaker 2 (00:44):
Yeah. So a lot of people have that issue. And
I'm really honored to have worked with Paradigm for Parody,
who authored a study called the Impact of Personal Financial
Stress on Black Women in the Workplace, And that came
about a few years ago. A company called Honeybee, that

(01:05):
helps employers give their employees short term loans so they
don't have to take payday loans, was telling me about
this issue and I was like, wow, I didn't even
think about what a big problem. That is, it turns
out eighty percent of American workers are experiencing unmanageable stress.
And then I looked for research on Black women and
guess what, there wasn't any, so figured it hit them worse.

(01:28):
So many thanks to Paradigm for Parody and Goldman Sachs,
whose one Million Black Women Initiative provided the grant. But
Sandra give us a scope of this problem and why
it affects Black women so differently.

Speaker 3 (01:42):
Yeah, so, first of all, thanks for having me here.
It's such a pleasure to share this microphone and this
time with all of you. You know, I think you
said it, Stacy at the beginning when you talked about
eighty percent of Americans at least deal with this issue.
And so for us, it was more than just thinking
about just black women, but it was thinking about all employees,

(02:03):
but understanding that that study and those percentages are higher
for Black women as we are sometimes head of homes,
single parents, trying to climb up the corporate letter, but
also experiencing all of the things that get in the
way of our success. And so for us, we thought
it was critically important to leverage the grant that we

(02:25):
received from Goldman Sachs to commission a study to just
talk about the real issues. You know, there are lots
of things out there that when it comes to financial
wellness or wellness you know overall. And so for us,
we said, let's dig under wellness, let's peel back the layers,
and let's really think about what are those key stressors

(02:45):
that people show up every day with at work.

Speaker 4 (02:48):
And financial stress was one of those areas.

Speaker 1 (02:52):
And it's hard to talk to your employer about that too,
because you don't want to share certain things. You want
to come to work. And I was always taught whatever
personal problems you have at home, when you come to work,
leave that behind and nobody should know about that. You
should be there doing your job. And that's nothing that
your boss needs to know or anybody, your coworkers or anything.

(03:12):
But what are your thoughts about that? Because that is
something I feel like has been conditioned in us. Deal
with what you need to deal with personally at home,
come to work, be your best, and no one needs
to know.

Speaker 3 (03:23):
Yeah, well those days are gone, Angela, Right, those days
people are well. People show up their whole you know,
with their whole selves, but they bring all of that
with them into the workplace. And so if organizations, companies,
corporations want to get the best out of their brightest,
they have got to address the issues that get in
the way of your performance.

Speaker 2 (03:43):
Right.

Speaker 3 (03:43):
And so today we talk about any and everything at
the workplace, whether it's religion, whether it's politics. But you're right,
one of the areas that is still sort of uncharted
territory is around the financial piece. And so for us,
it's critically important that companies establish an atmosphere or a

(04:04):
place where you can be, where you can establish trust
and transparency and have these conversations.

Speaker 4 (04:10):
It is so critical for employers.

Speaker 3 (04:12):
To know what's holding their employees back from showing up
and being able to give their very best. And if
you can help mitigate some of that, then your employees
are freer to do the work that you pay them
to do every day.

Speaker 2 (04:25):
And more employers are getting on board. You see a
lot of them offering financial wellness programs, a lot of
them are doing things like paying down their employees student
loan debt. But just to give people Stacy's going into
her stats nerd mode, but just to give you a
sense of the scope of the problem for everybody. And
then obviously we're going to break down what this revolutionary

(04:46):
study found about black women. But as I said, eighty
percent of employers report this I thought was really crazy.
Eighty percent of employers say financial stress is lowering their employees'
performance level and its cost sting them half a trillion
dollars a year. So that's why you're seeing in the
business case, employees burdened by money matters are nine times

(05:08):
more likely to have troubled relationships with co workers. They're
taking it out on their co workers, and thirty seven
percent of employees say they have more debt than they
can manage, and sixty percent of employees say that they're
more likely to stay with an employer that offers a
program designed to help them manage their money. But Jacquet,
you're a financial behaviorist. So with all these realities, like

(05:29):
Angela was saying, people still don't want to talk about it.

Speaker 5 (05:33):
They don't. And I just want to backtrack a little
bit because I would say, you don't leave yourself behind
the you know, the door if you will. So I
think these issues have been showing up at work for
a very, very long time. We're just now actually addressing it.

Speaker 2 (05:49):
But to the point of your question.

Speaker 5 (05:51):
You know, I did a seventh city tour for one
law firm and a single session for another last year,
and what I thought was really fascinating is for the
multiple city engagement, by the time I got to city
number three, I had to call back to New York
and say, you know what, can you not have the

(06:12):
partners in the room for the entire session, have them
kick us off, and then have them come back and
close us out, Because the level of engagement with the associates,
whether they were summer or midyear, was very, very different
when a partner was in the room, even if they
weren't on that partner's team, versus when it was just

(06:34):
them amongst their peers. So a part of it is
you don't want to You don't want to reveal either
what you don't know or what you're not doing to
someone who might have an impact on what assignments you
might be given or what scope of responsibilities you might have.
And I think the thing there is we forget how

(06:54):
much money is so much a part of our identity
that people think that, oh my goodness, if I reveal this,
they're going to think that this is directly connected to
my skill set and then I won't be able to,
you know, follow through on whatever assignment that they've given me.
And the on the flip side, last year, I had
someone give feedback that says, well, she didn't tell us

(07:17):
how to pay our rent, and it's like, hmm, I
never promised aya how to but be how do you
get to law school and you don't have that basic
life skill. And so I think that there's a coming together,
and not in such a positive way, of the reality
that so many people are coming into adulthood and they

(07:41):
don't know the basic skills of how to make financial
decisions and how to make trade offs and how to
you know, be honest with themselves about I want to
live in New York City, but maybe I can't because
I can't afford it. So maybe I need to go
to an outer borrow like they don't want to make
those tough trade offs. And I think that that's part
of the challenge too.

Speaker 2 (08:01):
Absolutely, let's get into the study. It is called the
Invisible Weight, the Impact of Personal Financial Stress on Black
Women in the Workplace, And I thought it was interesting
that if I can find them, some of the key
stressors were cost of living, just room paying, their bills.

(08:24):
Oh sorry, the three biggest stressors. Number one cost of
living household bills that was over sixty percent, living paycheck
to paycheck fifty percent, credit card debt almost fifty percent.
And we want to give a shout out here to Tiffany,
the budget nista, who was supposed to be joining us
today because when we reached out to her that we
wanted to do this study, she's like, y'all want to

(08:47):
talk to black women. I have almost three million black
women who follow me. So most studies you see are
about maybe fifteen hundred two thousand people. Within hours, we
had five thousand survey respondent, so this is the data
from them. But these are jack from a personal financial standpoint,
you know, living paycheck to paycheck, credit card net cost

(09:10):
a living. What are some things people should be doing
in their own lives?

Speaker 5 (09:15):
Oh my goodness, where do I begin? Can we just
again take a step back and also just talk about
how things are different today than they were even when
I started my career. I started in nineteen eighty six.
Right when I joined Bankers Trust, I had a defined
benefit plan. By the time I left ten years later,
it was a defined contribution plan. So people now have

(09:37):
more responsibility for their own retirement safety.

Speaker 2 (09:40):
Yes, that was a big worry, is well.

Speaker 5 (09:43):
The other thing is I think about how my mother
worked for Social Security for thirty eight years. I was
at Bankers Trust for ten. Most people these days stay
at their employer for what four point.

Speaker 2 (09:53):
Two years is now.

Speaker 5 (09:56):
And so when you think about the combination of those
two things, a lot of your financial safety net and
the things that provided you with financial security are just
not there any longer. And so you factor that in
with just the cost of everything going up. And this
is a study about black women. We still earn significantly

(10:18):
less than not only white men, but white women Asian women,
and so when you when all of the expenses that
you may or may not have direct control over go up,
it makes it even that much more challenging. So that's
the bad news.

Speaker 2 (10:32):
And black women are also eight times more likely to
be financially responsible for family for other family members exact.

Speaker 1 (10:39):
And being in feeling like my finances are directly connected
to care who I am and my character.

Speaker 5 (10:45):
Yes as a person, yeah, exactly. So that's the challenging news.
So what do you do on the other side of it?
Something that we are often not very good at doing.
We talk about wellness, prioritizing ourselves and saying no to
family and maybe friends, and making sure that we're taking
care of our financial household, not only in the present,
but also preparing ourselves for what may come in the future.

(11:09):
And so, to answer the question, there's no one size
fits all, But I think it is really coming to
terms with what you can and cannot do and letting
it be okay if you can't do something specifically that
you really want to.

Speaker 3 (11:24):
Yeah, and our families culturally are so important to us, right,
and you know it's not only just your immediate family,
but your extended family, you know. But I had a
financial advisor once give an example of how she takes
care of herself and prioritize herself but also her family.
She has an account and she says she puts certain

(11:44):
amount of money in that account that is comfortable for her,
and once that little fund is gone for that month,
other people in her family come asking. She says, you know, no,
you got to come back another time. So again, it's
ways that we can do it. But it's about the
choice and the decisions that we make, right.

Speaker 5 (12:03):
Feel we feel bad when we say no right, you know,
when we have that balance, But.

Speaker 3 (12:07):
It's the responsible thing exactly right. And that's another piece
of it.

Speaker 2 (12:12):
Talk about taking responsibility for our choices. So we're a
lot of shame and blame around this that we've been discussing,
but there are resources out there and if you're quiet,
you're not going to find out what your company is
actually offering. And that's what this is all about and
fortunate responsibility.

Speaker 1 (12:32):
Can I say one thing to also in the workplace
is advocating for yourself and negotiating And I think that's
a really important thing. And they've done studies about black
women and how much we don't do that, and so
I just want to point that out too. Is being
able to go and so because a lot of times
we get a lot of extra responsibilities put on us
in addition to what we have to do outside of work,

(12:54):
but going in there and saying okay, well look it's
time for me to discuss this. Can we set up
a meeting to talk about my rape or negotiating a
salary or bonuses or extra things like working from home
on Fridays or half days maybe in the summer, whatever
it is that you feel like could help you again
with your own self care and what you need to
do to handle your business outside of work, because sometimes

(13:15):
we're so wrapped up in working later than everybody, showing
up earlier than everybody, doing things outside of our responsibilities,
and people don't even realize because we're not championing and
letting them know this is what we're doing, and this
is what I've been doing, and this is what I deserve.

Speaker 5 (13:30):
That's such a good point because the reality is every
time you don't negotiate, you're putting yourself further and further
and further behind. Then we're perhaps you ought to be
or could be. And the other thing I want to
add on to that is, and you see this more
in the entrepreneurial space, but I think it's relevant in
more professional settings as well. Is this whole idea of

(13:50):
charging what you're worth. I hate that phrase, and I
really despise that phrase because black. My heritage is Jamaican American.
We have an ancestral h histay where there was a
dollar amount attached to our humanity. So when you say
charge what you're worth, I viscerally experience it as somebody
putting a dollar amount on my body, on your body,

(14:12):
et cetera, and not attaching it to what's the skill
that you're bringing to the table, what's the perspective, what
are your gifts your talents? Right, all of that wrapped
up in one And I think a part of the
challenge is when people say, you know, or adopt or
embrace this whole notion of charging what you're worth, they
get caught up and well, can I ask for that

(14:34):
because they don't have they don't feel that they have
proven that they're worth it. When it's not about you
as an individual, it's about the packaging of your skill set,
your expertise, your perspective, your education, both formal and informal,
Like what is the value that you're bringing to the
particular business situation or challenge or problem that you're helping

(14:56):
someone or some company solve.

Speaker 2 (14:58):
I mean, you do have to take responsibility, like Angela
was saying, for not only advocating yourself, but educating yourself.
Companies offer benefits around financial wellness. Sandra, you have an
amazing story about your will. I'd love for you to
share that.

Speaker 4 (15:14):
Yeah, absolutely so, You're absolutely right.

Speaker 3 (15:17):
There are all kind of benefits out there and lots
of times you don't even know that these benefits exist
right in your organization. And I was telling Stacey that,
you know, my husband and I a few years ago,
we needed to do a will and we had started
looking around and it was gonna cost us thousands of
dollars to sit down with somebody, and we really did
not at that moment have that money.

Speaker 4 (15:37):
And we could have just said, you know what, well,
we're not.

Speaker 5 (15:39):
Going to do it right.

Speaker 3 (15:40):
We couldn't prioritize that in the moment, but we knew
we needed to because we have a child. We wanted
to make sure everything.

Speaker 4 (15:47):
Was in order.

Speaker 3 (15:49):
And I started sort of looking around at our benefits.
I said, let me go check our benefits page and
see what I offer. And our company, my company offered
to pay and they paid for so all you had
to do was book the appointment.

Speaker 4 (16:02):
I did not even know. These are the small things
that make a.

Speaker 3 (16:06):
Big difference, and it really does help to secure talent
and it re recruits people back to their organizations to
know that my organization cares enough about me to be
able to offer these types of benefits. But you're right, Stacey,
and other things that you have to understand are do
they offer emergency savings, what about financial coaching, what about

(16:26):
financial advisors? I mean these are questions you can ask.
What about student loan repayment, what about well tracking? What
about a helpline that just may even give you advice? Right,
So taking advantage of all of those opportunities and thinking
about ways that your company might be able to support you,
but go out and really research those benefits so that

(16:48):
you can understand how your companies can alleviate some of
that stress.

Speaker 2 (16:52):
As financial behaviorists, how do we get over ourselves and
make ourselves do that?

Speaker 5 (16:57):
Well, you know what, I'm going to give that some
extra thing, but also take advantage of your four one
K plan or whatever their time are.

Speaker 2 (17:04):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (17:05):
I hear so many people say I'm going to get
this job and I'm only going to be here for
a short amount of time, so I'm not going to
worry about it, and then they look up and five years.

Speaker 4 (17:13):
Later, ten years been a place and they never.

Speaker 5 (17:16):
Invested so all of that stuff that they lost out on.
So to your question, what are some of the resources,
because that was your question, yes.

Speaker 2 (17:23):
Right now, how do we get out, get over ourselves
and go A lot of people will sit in this
stress and let me actually to emphasize that, I want
to read you a couple of comments from some of
the survey participants. Quote, I'm so focused on my financial
issues that I am making mistakes at work no matter

(17:44):
how hard I try to concentrate. Quote you have one
hundred tabs open in your mind surrounding finances and an
additional one hundred open for work. Quote something I have
to close my door to keep from anyone seeing me
cry or have anxiety attacks. Takes up to twenty minutes
sometimes to get rep focused. And another one it affected
my blood pressure or my health. My blood pressure shut up,

(18:05):
I had migraines, and I got sick more often than usual.
This person, we the people who are sitting with all
of this and trying to hide it, how do we
get step out of our own get out of our
own way.

Speaker 5 (18:18):
Well, one of the first things you have to do is,
since you have recognized it, raise your hand and ask
for help. Yeah, and you know, maybe that doesn't come
from someone within your firm initiation.

Speaker 2 (18:29):
And it's not going to feel comfortable.

Speaker 5 (18:31):
It's not, but it's not. It's not supposed to.

Speaker 3 (18:35):
It.

Speaker 4 (18:35):
It's painful for a reason.

Speaker 5 (18:36):
And typically when you have pain involved, there is something
that needs to happen to alleviate that. And in this instance,
it is coming clean with somebody, whether it's a you know,
a significant other, whether it's a really close friend, or
whether it's a professional. And I'm of the mindset that
everyone should have, hopefully a financial advisor, but if not,

(18:59):
everybody should have CPA. If you're working in the kind
of professions that we're talking about, for a lot of people,
you should have a CPA. That person should be able
to actually see things. And I have a story about this,
see things that you may not be noticing. But even
if they aren't, they should be the person that you
go to to say, hey, this is what's happening. What

(19:20):
do you see going on with my numbers? That can
help me out? And if I can share a really
quick story, this is going back now to two thousand
and three. I'm going out to Long Island to see
my CPA, mister Bethood, And this is just like a
normal in my mind. You know, it's tax season, normal session.
And he's been doing my taxes since nineteen eighty eight,

(19:40):
personally in nineteen ninety five for my business. But it
was an unusual conversation because he says to me, when
are you going to stop mortgaging your life? And I'm
looking at him, like, what are you talking about? The
reason he was asking that question, although I didn't know
it in the moment or didn't see it in the moment,
it was because my business wasn't doing well or as

(20:03):
well as I've thought. And the reason it wasn't doing
well is because I was subsidizing it, dipping into my savings,
selling some of my investment portfolio, increasing my personal and
business credit card debt. I was doing all of those things,
though in support of I want my business to be successful,
I want it to be profitable, and I don't want

(20:23):
to be broke. But I was doing all the things
that were opposite of that, all of the things that
were the opposite of what I had been taught personally,
academically and professionally. And we've been talking a lot about
the stresses that you can notice, but I think we
also need to talk about the stress that you don't notice.
Because that was financial stress. I didn't recognize it as

(20:44):
financial stress. I recognized it as I'm doing all of
the things that I think I need to do to
help my business be successful.

Speaker 2 (20:51):
Yeah, And I've heard you say before you would not
use your own money to bud nope of business.

Speaker 1 (20:57):
And you know, even for me, like being a person
who is invested in my own businesses, always right, always
been self funded. The one thing for me, I feel
like I work this job to be able to control
and manage my businesses. And sometimes that's hard too because
I feel like, Okay, at least I didn't have to
dip into my savings. At least I'm not doing this.

(21:19):
At least I'm not doing that. But it's not easy
when you're an entrepreneur. And one thing that one of
our employees told us that at one of our businesses
was listen. Whenever there's an issue or something is not
going right, we get reprimanded and it becomes like a
whole thing. But we don't get told when we're doing
things great. And we need to know positive reinforcement too.

(21:43):
And that was something that always stuck with me, is
that a lot of times you do hear from upper
management when things aren't going right, But what about when
things are going well? When do you get that like, oh,
you did a great job. I just want to say,
I just want to sit down and let you know
this or you know things like that are important too.
For more so you don't feel like you're being overlooked
and people aren't paying attention to it and only paying

(22:04):
attention to you when it's negative.

Speaker 3 (22:06):
Yeah, and that's an investment in your people, which then
leads to the trust and transparency, which then leads to
the ability to say, hey, Jack heat I'm struggling, you know, financially,
and it's causing me to have stress at work and
that's why I'm not showing up as my best self,
or you noticing my behaviors are changing or my work
is changing, and being able to sit down with me

(22:29):
and say, hey, what's going on versus just.

Speaker 4 (22:30):
Labeling me as not a good employee. But what's going on?
Let me help you.

Speaker 3 (22:36):
And then back to the point earlier Stacey that you mentioned,
how do we sometimes get out of our own way?
What I find is lots of times we think it's
just us, It's just me, I'm the only one going
through this. But the minute that you confide in someone else,
find someone else to have a conversation with, because I
promise you it is not just you. Right, And even

(22:59):
in the workplace, you know, if you're in if they
have employee networks, leverage those networks, ask to talk about.

Speaker 2 (23:06):
Some of the benefits, talk about some of the resources
employers offer.

Speaker 3 (23:11):
Yeah, and so the employee networks is one and leveraging
that as sort.

Speaker 4 (23:15):
Of your group that you can go to and you can.

Speaker 3 (23:17):
Leverage and have these conversations. Ask your employer to put
on a webinar or a seminar around financial wellness, and
then also ask them to talk about the benefits that
are out there that maybe are hidden benefits that you
didn't even know existed, the ones that people don't even
really think about, but that are those life benefits that

(23:37):
can really help support you. I remember several this is
when COVID was happening. My grandmother fell and my family
we needed somebody to help take care of her every day,
but no one had the funding to really be able
to send someone in to help support her.

Speaker 4 (23:56):
So what did I do again?

Speaker 3 (23:58):
I looked to the benefits in my company and I said,
let me see what we offer.

Speaker 4 (24:02):
And we did.

Speaker 3 (24:03):
We offered a benefit where I could subsidize and pay
someone to come in and help support and take care
of my grandmother. Do you know the level of stress
your company after that, my company offers that.

Speaker 2 (24:16):
A lot of companies, see that's what I wanted to
talk about. A lot of companies offer things and people
aren't aware. But it's on the companies if you look
at that, if you break down this survey which everybody,
you can get paradigm for parody dot org. We'll talk
more about that in just a minute. A lot of
the women say that they don't trust their employers with

(24:38):
their financial and with their information, and that they think
it's somehow going to you know, come back to bite them.
So companies have to create that safe space.

Speaker 4 (24:46):
That's right.

Speaker 5 (24:47):
One of the ways that they can do that is
to model what they do for EAP, the Employee Assistance Program.

Speaker 1 (24:53):
That's right.

Speaker 5 (24:54):
When I was at Banker's Trust, I started seeing a
therapist and I've had I did my first three sessions
through the therapy that I got through EAP because they
paid for those sessions, and then I continued on outside
of that. But so if you do it in that
kind of a situation, there's an ethical boundary that has
to be honored in terms of the confidentiality. And even

(25:15):
when I do coaching, because sometimes for the law firms,
it'll be a presentation and coaching. I can tell them
who signed up for coaching, but I will never divulge
what was discussed in those sessions. So in terms of
that confidentiality, I think it has to be clear around
how it's structured and what information will and will not
be exchanged. Unless, of course, somebody is, you know, on

(25:38):
the verge of some sort of self harm, then that's
the one exception that you make to crossing that line,
if you will. But I also think part of the
challenge is you hear about these things during your orientation
and then annually when it's time to renew your you
know packages, and look at your four oh one k allocations,

(26:00):
there's nothing. It's just here's the renewal like it's October
or November, whatever, the renewal time is. Now, re select
your healthcare plan that they said this that goes along
with it.

Speaker 1 (26:13):
Or sometimes I have a seminar and people don't go.

Speaker 5 (26:17):
And then and then if no one shows up, then
they're like, oh, no one's interested, so we're not going
to bother offering this again. So it's a two way
street in terms of yes, the companies need to be
proactive but so to do the employee.

Speaker 2 (26:30):
That's right, Yeah, it's well companies, it's on the radar
now because this is costing companies half a trillion dollars
a year. That's an awful lot of money. Yeah, it's
definitely getting on the radar now.

Speaker 5 (26:42):
Focusing on wellness, and something has been growing in the
last you know.

Speaker 2 (26:46):
And what Amazon and Home Depot they start okay, oh,
student loan debt, they started paying off their employee student
loan debt.

Speaker 1 (26:52):
I think part of it is hiring has been tough
for people to and finding great employees is definitely a gem,
and so now there's a lot of extra incentives to
try to get people to want to say because I
feel like a lot of people, if you're great at
your job, you have a lot more options, right, yes,
than it used to be. So it's like how do
we retain?

Speaker 3 (27:12):
Yeah, and plus but you know you you you think
about what we pay out for medical you know the
reason why Part of that is because of the financial stress. Right,
So it's all sort of related, and you've got to
peel back and understand what is causing people to to
react this way. And I think once employers get that,
the one that truth, half a trillion. They're going to

(27:35):
save so much more money if they offer these benefits,
and some of these don't even have to cost a lot.

Speaker 5 (27:40):
Well, they also could increase people.

Speaker 3 (27:43):
Well equitable way, that's true. But then we got to
be responsible with those wages.

Speaker 2 (27:50):
And ask for them and and that's right.

Speaker 5 (27:53):
And even if you do get an increase, the things
that are causing you stress don't necessarily graduate now, right,
So you've got to have a system or a structure
of your own to help you manage that, because that's
an instance where having more will only give you a
little bit of relief in the short term. But if

(28:13):
you don't change your behavior, that's true, it's not gonna
it's not gonna be, you know, sustainable.

Speaker 1 (28:19):
What do you think is an indication that it's time
to just leave? This is not gonna work this? Yeah,
like this is affecting my life too much and I
just can't be here anymore. What are some indications that
this is just not a good fit.

Speaker 3 (28:33):
I think it's if you've done your due diligence. Sometimes
we leave prematurely because we haven't.

Speaker 2 (28:40):
Asked, because we don't go and have the conversation.

Speaker 3 (28:42):
Because we don't go and have the conversation. So what
we figure is we're just gonna leave. But what you
don't understand is those same problems are gonna follow you
to the next employer.

Speaker 2 (28:50):
Right, what we're talking about today, how you how you
internalize personal financial stress at work, that's gonna come with you.

Speaker 4 (28:57):
That's right.

Speaker 3 (28:58):
So I think it's doing that. But one you do, Angela,
to your point, have those conversations. You understand your value,
you've articulated that, you know you're good at what you do,
then it's time. And I say this all the time,
you should always.

Speaker 4 (29:12):
Be in the market.

Speaker 1 (29:13):
Yep.

Speaker 5 (29:14):
Always.

Speaker 3 (29:16):
You should always be in the market, and then you
can make a decision as to when you're ready to go.

Speaker 1 (29:21):
Because you never want to feel stuck in a situation.
I think sometimes people look at it like you're a
hamster in a will. I have to stay here. I
have this going on. It's only going to be worse
if I go somewhere else. Then I have to start
all over again. What if I hate that job too,
and I have bills to pay and people are really
nervous to take a leap.

Speaker 2 (29:40):
Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 5 (29:41):
One of the things I think, just from a tactical
standpoint is use the power of three. If you have
made a pitch for either more responsibility or for asking
for that raise or for that bonus, and you do
that three times and you don't get any response, you
don't get the response that you want. To me, that's
a there's a signal that it's probably time to move on.

(30:02):
But if it's one and done, maybe you were asking
the wrong person.

Speaker 4 (30:08):
But I think you need to do this.

Speaker 3 (30:10):
You know, you need to understand timing right and and
I remember this quote is that hungry people eat anything.
And you don't want to wait till you're hungry, because
you'll jump out there and take anything. And so you
always have to keep yourself in that mode so that
when it comes time and you've made up your mind
that you're ready to go, you've done your research, you've

(30:31):
done your homework, you know, you know you've you've had
the right conversations, and you know that this place is
not healthy for me, and I have to go in
order to save my own saying.

Speaker 1 (30:43):
I'm glad I'm a picky eater.

Speaker 4 (30:49):
That's right.

Speaker 2 (30:54):
We want to hear all about this incredible free masterclass
on this topic. September tenth in just a minute. But Sandra,
one thing I want you to touch on before we
finish up with that. A lot of the women surveyed
are worried about their personal finances affecting their career advancement.
That's for real, because a lot of companies actually do

(31:17):
look at your credit history to determine if they're going
to hire or promote you. So from both of your standpoints,
to me, that just reiterates how much you need to
be leaning into every resource offered to you.

Speaker 3 (31:30):
Absolutely, you know there's I think Jock heat may have
said this, but you've got to raise your hand and
you've got to ask for the help, and you've got
to understand that this will impact not only you, but
it also impacts your children.

Speaker 4 (31:44):
And your children's children and.

Speaker 3 (31:47):
Your family and you know, everything around you. So you
really have to lean in and understand that I have
got to ask for help and raise my hand, and
it's impacting more than just where I am today, but
where I can go to tomorrow.

Speaker 4 (32:01):
And there's nothing wrong. Like I haven't always.

Speaker 3 (32:03):
Had the best credit right I came out of college,
I had a ton of college debt I had.

Speaker 2 (32:12):
With life.

Speaker 4 (32:12):
I haven't always.

Speaker 3 (32:13):
Been in this place, but I made the small It's
the micro steps that you make that make such a
huge impact, starting with a budget, starting to understand how
do we really get ourselves out. We did credit counseling
for a while. We got with employers that gave us benefits.
That's another thing before you sign up for a job,

(32:34):
especially young people, before you go out there and take
a job, do your research and understand what they're offering you.
And don't just look at the salary, look at the
compensation package, everything.

Speaker 4 (32:46):
That they're offering you.

Speaker 3 (32:47):
Are they going to be able to, you know, help
me with you know, my medical Are they going to
be able to provide me with these benefits?

Speaker 4 (32:53):
Do they value me as a person? Do they have.

Speaker 3 (32:56):
Equity, diversity and inclusion at the top of their pillars?

Speaker 4 (32:59):
And are the acting on that right? All of that is.

Speaker 1 (33:02):
Getting rid of that right now? That is such a
tapic a company.

Speaker 4 (33:05):
I know that could be that could be another whole We'll.

Speaker 2 (33:09):
Be having that conversation before early November.

Speaker 3 (33:11):
Yeah, but you gotta do your homework to understand what
you're getting yourself into when you take a role with
a company and how they're treating their employees. But then
also you have to take some responsibility and I know
Jack Utt you have you know, have plenty to say
about that and things that we need to do.

Speaker 2 (33:28):
You can all hear about this on September tenth at
eleven am because there's a free master class. You're gonna
get your financial tips from the one and only absentee,
the budget neist. Tiffany will be there, Sando will be there,
Jacquette will be there. A shout out to TIAA for

(33:48):
sponsoring this masterclass. It's free and you can sign up
at Paradigm for Parody dot org. Right at the top
of their website, you'll see where you can register for
this for free. We're gonna have it on our social links.
But there's really never been a study like this before
the Invisible wait and people looking at how personal financial

(34:09):
stress affects our workplace performance. So just gratitude for Paradigm
for Parody for all that you've done for women. We
had the How cool was that when we got one
something Nasda such a proud.

Speaker 1 (34:22):
Moment, and I know that was the first time I
had talked about our building in Detroit, which is the
thirty unit building which is going to be done like
this month.

Speaker 3 (34:30):
Wow, that's awesome. That's awesome journey, What a journey. I
also want to thank Eqular because they helped to the
analysis analysis of the data, So thank you so much
to them as well.

Speaker 2 (34:44):
And I thank you guys. This was the first study
I've authored and done before.

Speaker 4 (34:50):
It was quite an experience. It was an experience.

Speaker 2 (34:52):
You say it and spell it.

Speaker 4 (34:54):
The website paradigm for parody dot org.

Speaker 3 (34:58):
So that's p A r a A d I GM the
number four P A R I t y dot org.

Speaker 2 (35:06):
This is free y'all. September tenth, eleven am. It's gonna
be incredible panel. Jaquette will be there, Sandra will be there,
Tiffany the budget and he still will be there.

Speaker 1 (35:16):
So maybe something to spread the word at your job,
if you know, when you're working some place, or even
if you're the employer. This is a great opportunity for
people to get this free masterclass.

Speaker 5 (35:27):
Can I say one more thing real quickly? I think
this is an excellent reminder that financial success is not
just about the numbers, right, So, just as your credit
score will go up and down, perhaps the numbers in
your accounts, your various accounts skills will go up and
down as well, So try as hard as it can

(35:47):
be at times not to attach again your identity to
what that number is or isn't, and really focus on
what are the questions I should be asking? That's what
are the people I should be tapping into for support
and what are the systems that I should be creating
to help me make better choices?

Speaker 2 (36:04):
Get out of our own thoughts. Thoughts aren't gloriou Steinem
always tells me that thoughts aren't things. Thoughts aren't things.
And everybody also follow Wealth Wednesdays on Instagram. Go to
team Wealth Wednesdays and please sign up our news Our
weekly newsletter is awesome. I gotta say it's awesome. Sign
up for that. And Wealth Wednesdays is on Way Up

(36:29):
with Ye and iHeartMedia, and I had to give a
special thank you to Way Up with Ye and iHeartMedia
for being the first to release this is a groundbreaking study,
you guys. It's going to be hitting all the media waves.
You'll be hearing a lot about it all over all
news and it was broken right here on Way Up
with Angela Yee because she's so awesome. Thank you.

Speaker 1 (36:51):
I appreciate it so much. I always love seeing all
of you, so thank you, likewise thank you